


the colour of your thoughts

by chantefable



Category: Black Sails, Persuasion - Jane Austen
Genre: Age of Sail, Alternate Universe, Character Study, Friends With Benefits, Introspection, M/M, Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-07
Updated: 2021-02-07
Packaged: 2021-03-12 01:07:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29251965
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chantefable/pseuds/chantefable
Summary: James' trip to Nassau was only three months, but it felt like three times as long.Captain Wentworth made it bearable.
Relationships: Captain Flint | James McGraw/Frederick Wentworth
Comments: 2
Kudos: 8
Collections: Chocolate Box - Round 6





	the colour of your thoughts

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thedevilchicken](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thedevilchicken/gifts).



It was three months, and it felt like three times as long. 

It was entirely sensible that it had been James who had been sent to Nassau. Over time, all of them – Lord Peter Ashe, Thomas, Miranda, and James himself – had been toiling incessantly over their lofty endeavour, campaigning for their plans to restore order in Nassau in a lawful fashion. This mission was foremost on James’ mind (for surely he could not let his thoughts stray towards – intimacy, or happiness, or love, lest he be overwhelmed by the brightness of it all, the improbability, the _impropriety_ ), and he willed himself to believe in its success. There were now at a point where Thomas said things; he had said that he had come to trust James – and James, in turn, had become used to having Thomas occupy every moment of his day and every corner of his mind; Thomas often said other things that made James almost bashful, blushing like a boy, and he would not allow himself to linger upon those as was, apparently, his wont. Thomas trusted him, and James almost thought that they might be able to succeed. However, it had become clear things could not continue as they were, and only so much could be accomplished in London alone. A greater impetus was much needed. 

And so, James had been promptly dispatched across the sea in order to talk to the governor. All in all, a most prompt affair. He was only gone for about three months. 

(But later, Thomas, darling Thomas, would say, “Three months. Feels like twice as long.”)

James was restless on the way there, watching the sea and the sky blur together in mottled shades of grey, blue and crimson as the ship sailed through the vast expanse of the indomitable ocean. He was determined to prove himself, to gather information and to make a point. He watched the foggy skyline and the future felt hazy. He was only sure of himself in the moment, convinced in the veracity of his own existence, the ship carrying him to Nassau, and the Captain of said ship, who proved to not have been a vision, after all. 

Captain Frederick Wentworth was the spitting image of Thomas, if deliciously younger. Had Wentworth not been a well-known figure – Croft’s brother-in-law, no less – James would have suspected a dastardly connection. But no, Frederick Wentworth was a man in his own right – and his face, his stature, his steely eyes and determined flush as they were setting sail from the English shores, his surly passion in the dark of the southern night, spurred by the memories of an old lover who had rejected him – his entire being was unexpectedly tender and amicably familiar, like freshest water and gentlest balm. Strangely, with him it was easy for James to let himself be loved, and do what nature demanded of him. Thomas’ name was engraved upon his soul, but Frederick’s hands touched him and soothed his ache and his perceived inadequacies. 

James was immeasurably grateful for their chance encounter, particularly when at long last they reached Nassau. Each day, each waking moment felt terrifyingly rapid and intense, a thousand different things happening in vibrant, gaudy colour. It was remarkably different from the way his life had been in England, no longer the eerie sensation of standing in the eye of a storm. Instead of being carried by the wave of the Hamiltons’ intellectual vigour, smothered in their lush, sharp drive, James was adrift again, facing life as it was, at its messiest, and the more he heard and watched, the more he felt like coming undone, like giving in to the beastly, sun-drenched reality of pure chaos. Chaos, and good intentions crushed by the senselessness of unpredictable people and unpredictable things. The pirates gained control of Nassau. The governor and his family were killed.

James was of no use to their plan. James felt useless, unnecessary, and, because of that, once again, awkward and unloved. 

And the way back was the most agonising part of it all. 

During the day, James was pacing, composing letters that he would never commit to paper, trying, in the privacy of his tattered thoughts, to force order where there was none, to make sense of the present situation and path forward. He was drowning in rivers of imaginary ink, trying to describe what little he knew in the most complete, most pertinent way. 

And during the night, he was lulled by the waves of memory, by the waves of desire. By the waves of loss that rippled across his flesh, making his skin crawl and leaving him nauseous as if he were a sea-sick boy, nauseous like a widower at the gaping mouth of a spouse’s grave. A phantom loss crashed against his mind like a tidal wave, and although it was unlived and unreal, it coloured the edge of his vision dark, it specked the inside of his eyelids with bright silver, it thrummed with blood inside his ears until he would be heaving, feverish and dumb. 

It was only when Frederick’s arm rested across his midriff, grasping James tight and anchoring him down, that James would feel the strangeness abate, the hungry shaking darkness dissipate into the regular black of the night on a ship, and then the dreams would swallow him whole. 

The journey took three months, and it felt like three times as long. But Frederick made it bearable.

**Author's Note:**

> The title is from Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, Meditations, Book V, 16 (Hays translation):
> 
> "The things you think about determine the quality of your mind. Your soul takes on the color of your thoughts."


End file.
